celebrating my kiddos

Driving in the car yesterday, my son says to me, "Mom, I don't understand why you buy people flowers for Valentine's Day?" I said, "Well it's just a nice thing to do. People like flowers." He says "Why don't you just take them to a flower shop and look around?"

At this point I'm cracking up. But I try to explain that you can put them on your desk or kitchen table and it looks pretty and reminds you of the nice gesture. He then adds, "Well then why not just take a picture?" I can see I have a little work to do on his romantic skills. And this from a boy who from when he was a toddler would always pick wildflowers and give them to me! I have hope he'll revert to his old ways.

My daughter just told me that her favorite store Justice has a new line of "green" clothes, and lots of "tree hugger stuff." "I think you would like it," she said. "Do you think I am a tree hugger?" I said. "YES! Mom, you are the ultimate tree hugger hippie freak." LMAO!

Today I celebrated my kids with a yummy dinner. I have an ice cube tray with hearts, and I made these by using red food coloring in orange juice. Then I place 3 ice cubes in each glass, which we filled with sparkling apple cider. It was good!

Dinnertime! I bought the kids a couple roses and set the table all nice, and made red-dyed orange juice ice hearts in their glasses of sparkling cider, lemon chicken cutlets, spinach salad, pears, and parmesan rissotto. And amazingly both kids ate EVERY bite!!
OK the pic didn't turn out great, but we here's a pic of the lemon chicken cutlets (it's dipped in lemon juice then breaded and cooked in a little bit of oil), parmesan risotto (don't worry, I'm not that prodigious - it's from a box - BUT it was an organic and all-natural one!) and spinach salad. It was all very good!!

OK I look like a dork but whatever... I think this is the first picture of my daughter with her braces! :)

The best part - both kids ate every bite including salad!! This was the first time I'd made this recipe and made the risotto- ka-ching!

I'll leave you with some of my favorite quotes. Wishing lots of love and light and laughter to you!!

This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
-- Shakespeare's Hamlet

It is not by accident that the happiest people are those who make a conscious effort to live useful lives. Their happiness, of course, is not a shallow exhilaration where life is one continuous intoxicating party. Rather, their happiness is a deep sense of inner peace that comes when they believe their lives have meaning and that they are making a difference for good in the world.
-- Ernest Fitzgerald

The road to glory is not strewn with flowers.
-- Jean de la Fontaine

Don't ask yourself what the world needs; ask yourself what makes you come alive. And then go and do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.
-- Harold Whitman

In the end we shall have had enough of cynicism and skepticism and humbug and we shall want to live more musically.
– Vincent van Gogh

Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.
-- Mark Twain